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I’ve never been a fan of the fey or faerie elements in the D&D game. For the most part, it was generally detailed as the home of the elves and the differences between the fey folk and the elves seemed paper thin at best. About the only thing I really recall even being of the fey was the old faerie dragons.

That has changed a little recently. Not only has the Open Design brought some adventurers that make the lands of the fey and the inhabitants of that land more distinct and useful for the 3.5 edition of Dungeons and Dragons, its like WoTC decided, to make fey something different and core in 4e itself. Now the whole fey and elf thing is still way too close for me. Heck, the eladrin and the fey are essentially one and the same on some levels but its provided a lot more character.

So when Critter Cache went with Fey Folk, I was curious as to where it would fall. Done up in the standard two column format with black and white art and green borders, the cover price, $4.99, matches the previous books. For the page count, it seems a good deal.

In terms of contents, the book includes a brief introduction to the Seelie and Unseelie Courts, as well as new monsters to add to your campaign. Art is handled by Jesse Mohn who does a fine job of bringing the book to life. If you like the cover art, you’ll enjoy the art inside.

Some of the naming conventions sound familiar to me, and I’m unsure if that’s because the monsters were in a previous edition or had game stats from a third party publisher, or because I’ve read about it somewhere else. But those who who enjoy faerie beasts, we have the cu sidhe, cait sidhe, and the pooka, or faerie horse. It’s always interesting to see what new animals are populating a new region and the feywild now has some new options for the GM. The pooka even includes a special ability for those GMs who wish to allow their players a unique mount.

Gremlins are broken up into three varieties, boggard, knockers and reapers. I like the idea of the latter, the reapers, being actual representations of the natural forces of death and bad luck to insure that those elements get their due in any climate or setting.

One of the areas where the author takes a slightly different path than previous editions have, is in making nymph’s more than just the old tree beasties. Here, naiad, oread, maenad, avernead and alseid all fall under the category. It’s an interesting change but with the limited space here, doesn’t get a chance to do more than provide the game stats, some brief back ground and some skill challenge ratings. One side line of the section though, is the enamored, human men, often warriors, that have fallen under the nymph’s power.

One of the nice things about 4e is that a single monster name, is often associated with different examples of a creature. This is handy when introducing monsters like the Red Cap, where we get a minion, the red cap warrior, and then specific types to fill out monster roles like red cap belly ripper, a lurker, or the red cap blood magus, a controller (leader), among others.

The book ends with a listing of monsters by level, and it includes the name, level, role, and page number. A quick reference here shows monsters starting at 4th level and ending at 18th level with a Spriggan Titan Guard acting as an elite soldier.

If there is a problem with the book, it’s that it could easily to two or three times as long. For example, who wouldn’t want stats on the rulers of the Seelie and Unseelie courts? Who doesn’t want game rules to run the sidhe as characters? I wouldn’t mind seeing Fey as a power source with new magic items, feats, and other assorted bits of crunch thrown in there.

However, that is not this product’s goal. The Critter Cache books are a quick dash of instant monster utility to fill out the Game Master’s library of useful beasties to throw into the campaign as enemies and allies and in that area, the Fey Folk does its job well.